Eric Church's “Darkest Hour” honors hurricane victims in North Carolina

Eric Church has released a new song called “Darkest Hour (Helene Edit)” to help victims of Hurricane Helene's devastation in western North Carolina.

Hurricane Helene devastated the southeastern United States last week, destroying entire towns in the mountains of North Carolina – the church's home state – as well as Tennessee, South Carolina, Florida and Georgia.

The storm was catastrophic: as of Thursday (October 3), the death toll had risen to 200, with hundreds if not thousands of people still missing.

“In your darkest hour / Baby, I come running / In your darkest hour / Baby, I'm not too weak / Baby, don't give up / I'll do everything in my power / To give myself just one minute take from your darkest hour, Church sings on the chorus of “Darkest Hour.”

“There are places that have simply disappeared biblically. These are our family members, they are our friends, they are our neighbors – and they desperately need help,” says Church.

A press release states that the country star will donate “all of his publishing royalties” for this song to the people of North Carolina. The song was already taking shape – he was working on new music – but disastrous circumstances in his home state forced Church to release it earlier than planned.

It's his first new solo music in three years.

“I had written this song and the line that stood out to me in the face of the recent devastation was: “I come running,“Because there are a lot of people out there right now who are in their darkest hour and they need people to stand by them,” explains the star. “We wanted to wait until next year to release the music, but that just didn't happen.” I feel right waiting with this song. Sometimes you give songs their moment and sometimes they find their own moment.

While proceeds from the song will help North Carolina, The church's charitable initiative Chief Cares Fund, will help all communities affected by the storm.

The church isn't the only one jumping in quickly to help communities devastated by the wind and flooding in Helene: Morgan Wallen just donated $500,000 to the relief effort, and Luke Combs plans to do the same very soon to do something.